By Scott Gilfoid: If you’re wondering why Amir Khan wasn’t selected as Manny Pacquiao’s next opponent for his 4/9 fight on HBO PPV, it’s because he was rejected by the Cable and satellite distributors, according to Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank.
They rejected the 29-year-old Khan for a variety of reasons for the Pacquiao fight. First of all, they felt that Khan’s record was blemished with defeats, and they weren’t impressed with his ratings for previous fights.
If Khan couldn’t bring in good ratings on regular Showtime or HBO, then it’s likely that he wouldn’t pull in the fans for a pay-per-view fight against Pacquiao. They also thought that Khan wouldn’t perform. I’m not entirely sure what they mean by that, but my guess is they thought Khan would run around the ring trying to keep from getting hit by Pacquiao all night long.
Khan moves a lot, and he does a lot of shoving and putting his opponents in headlocks and leaning on the back of their necks. Some of the stuff Khan does isn’t as bad as it used to be before he started training with Virgil Hunter in the Bay Area in Northern California. Given that Khan is no longer the most active fighters, it’s quite possible that his old habits might have crept back in with him not training a lot anymore.
“They didn’t feel Khan would do anything,” Arum said to the latimes.com about the cable and satellite distributors rejecting Khan as an opponent for Pacquiao. “[Khan] has a spotty record, hasn’t done great ratings. Why would we feel he’d do well on pay-per-view?”
The Cable and satellite distributors also said that Khan is not “that well known yet,” which I kind of agree with. Khan obviously well known in the UK, where he comes from, but in the United States he just hasn’t had enough fights and he’s not looked great in the fights that he’d had over there.
Khan has fought only eight times in the United States in the five years that he’s been fighting there. Eight times is obviously not going to be enough to build a large fan base and bring in good ratings. Look Terence Crawford. He’s been fighting in the United States his entire career, and he’s not someone that brings in huge Saul “Canelo” Alvarez or Gennady Golovkin type ratings.
Here are the fights that Khan has had in the United States:
Paulie Malignaggi – (2010) – Madison Square Garden, NY
Marcos Rene Maidana – (2010) – Las Vegas, Nevada
Zab Judah – (2011) – Las Vegas
Lamont Peterson – (2011) – Washington, DC
Danny Garcia – (2012) – Las Vegas
Luis Collazo – (2014) – Las Vegas
Devon Alexander – (2014) – Las Vegas
Chris Algieri – (2015) – Brooklyn, New York
In fairness to Khan, he probably never had a chance to get the fight with Pacquiao from the very start simply because he’s managed by Al Haymon. That’s a guy that Arum rarely does business with. He worked with Haymon for the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Pacquiao fight, but that was a different situation due to all the cash that was up for grabs for that fight.
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